Donors

Faculty Emeritus Roger Barrett joined the St. Cloud State University faculty in 1949 and served as director of bands for eighteen years. He received several awards throughout his career including the MMEA service award and the induction into the MMEA Music Educators Hall of Fame. The Roger Barrett Brass Scholarship in Music Education was established in 1987 to support music majors pursuing a Bachelor of Science degree instrumental music education.

Bruce Pearson's career as a teacher, composer, consultant, writer has established his international reputation for excellence in the field of band education. Bruce Pearson is the recipient of both an SCSU Honorary Doctorate and Distinguished Alumni Award. His love for instrumental music began while attending St. Cloud State University in 1964 where he earned a degree in Music Education. Each year, Bruce and Dee Pearson donate to the Department of Music Scholarship Fund to help award a student embarking on a career in music education with an instrumental emphasis.

Anne Simonett was a graduate of Little Falls High School and earned bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in piano performance from Lawrence University in 1974 and Yale in 1977.  She went on to law school at Harvard University, graduating in 1981.  It was not a stretch for Anne to go from being a pianist to being a judge.  She said, “Music is an intellectual exercise, but the main thing is – other than enriching your soul, which I think music does – the discipline it teaches you will serve you in any profession.” Simonett has a memorial scholarship fund in her name.

Faculty Emeritus Charles Echols was Professor of Music at St. Cloud State from 1972 until his retirement the spring of 2005. Dr. Echols served as Director of Music at St. Mary’s Cathedral of St. Cloud for 25 years. A prolific performer, he has performed all 10 of the organ symphonies of Charles-Marie Widor and the six organ symphonies of Vierne in a series of faculty concerts across Minnesota. Echols has a music scholarship awarded in his name.

Charlotte West Anderson received her music, mathematics, and elementary education degrees from St. Cloud State University in 1948.  She spent most of her career in education as a music teacher. Through her generosity to St. Cloud State University and the string program, Charlotte West Anderson has designated an award for a music-major whose principal instrument is strings.

Cristine Ann Rehwaldt was a talented musician and top student. Her years were dedicated to a search for love, light, truth, trust and peace. The purpose of the Cristine Rehwaldt Memorial Scholarship is to support the education of outstanding violin students during their first year of attendance at SCSU. If no violinist is found, the award may be made to incoming music students in other fields who demonstrate superior potential.

Faculty Emeritus Harvey Waugh established the Harvey Waugh Memorial String Scholarship for a music-major whose principal instrument is strings. Harvey Waugh was foremost a team player. In 1949, during the centennial celebrations of the State of Minnesota, he co-wrote and produced the musical Minnesota.  During World War II while in the military he was the chief music arranger for the world renowned Blue Jacket Choir. They sang in Great Britain and throughout mainland Europe.  They sang for the memorial services of the late President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt.  Following the War, he was asked to go to Augsburg, Germany, where he conducted a combined army-municipal band.

Harvey and English Professor Amy Dale also co-wrote the University Hymn in 1939, Dale penning the lyrics which Waugh set to music.

David Swenson graduated from St. Cloud State in 1976 with a music education degree. He was a percussionist with multiple goals in music and life, and in 1994 he posthumously established a foundation dedicated to advancing the percussive arts at St. Cloud State University. The David Swenson Foundation Percussion Scholarship is a four-year award granted to those outstanding musicians pursuing a degree in music whose primary instrument is percussion.

Faculty Emeritus Ruth Gant joined the faculty at St. Cloud State University in the fall of 1946.  While at SCSU she taught piano, organ and music theory. Ruth loved music, students, and St. Cloud University and was a devoted teacher who always expected the best of her students.  In addition to being a dedicated teacher, Gant was an accomplished pianist, garnering many enthusiastic reviews in the 1920s ‘30s, and ‘40s when she performed in cities such as Indianapolis, Indiana, and Emporia, Kansas. A piano scholarship has been established in her name.

Andrea Arriagada was a very talented and gifted young musician. She loved theater, set design, painting, drawing, ceramics, origami, quilting and played the clarinet, piano, and marimba. In September 2005 Andrea started her first year at St. Cloud State University, where she received a SCSU Foundation Scholarship. Andrea Arriagada passed tragically on October 8, 2005. 

She will live forever in the hearts and voices of her family and many friends. A memorial voice scholarship has been established in Arriagada's name.

Faculty Emeritus Helen Huls was a vocal music instructor at SCSU for 43 years from 1926 until her retirement in 1969.  She was widely known in the Upper Midwest as a choral director, speaker, clinician and adjudicator for vocal competitions.  She studied the problems experienced by immature singers and published her findings in a book, The Adolescent Voice. The Helen Steen Huls Memorial Voice Scholarship Foundation was established by Fred Huls as a memorial to his wife shortly after her death in 1971.

Faculty Emeritus Mabeth Gyllstrom received her doctorate in vocal performance at the University of Michigan and a master’s degree in vocal performance at Northwestern University.  She received a Music Education Degree from Augsburg College in Minneapolis.  She taught voice from 1968-98 in the Music Department at St. Cloud State University. The Mabeth Saure Gyllstrom scholarship has been established in Gyllstrom's name.

Mildred McGonagle graduated from the SCSU class of 1943. As teacher, advocate, promoter and supporter, Mildred has helped the arts thrive in Central Minnesota. She established a scholarship for voice students at St. Cloud State in 2002. The McGonagle scholarship was set up for sophomore music students with operatic potential.

Faculty Emeritus Myrl Carlsen retired in 1963 after 37 years in the St. Cloud State University Music Department. She is the first person in the history of the college’s Alumni Association to establish a perpetual endowment scholarship fund while still living. Myrl was on the local board of directors for the Minnesota Symphony, and for 28 years was the executive secretary and concert manager of the St. Cloud Symphony Association. She was the St. Cloud area chairman to promote the annual Metropolitan Opera Company Festival in Minneapolis for over 30 years.